The 100 Year Miracle (30 page)

Rachel risked a glance over her shoulder.

Bad idea. Terrible. Someone was there. She was not imagining it, not running from some ground squirrel or bunny rabbit up past his bedtime. John? It had to be him, and he was not more than thirty feet behind her, and his legs—not recently dipped in the icy bay waters—were churning up ground faster than she ever would. She would not make it. She could not win. There was nothing she could do.

She turned her face back around, and she was blind.

33.

The headlights were so bright that her vision ceased to exist. It was like looking into a solar eclipse. Rachel knew she would never see again, and it did not matter because in a moment, in just one second, the bumper of whatever that was would impact her femurs—both of them. They would shatter, and she would fall. Just a little. Just enough for the car to eat her up and suck her under and for the tires to run over her body, crushing her pelvis and her ribs and her spine, popping organs like Jell-O–filled balloons, shredding muscle and nerve fiber and killing her, although not instantly. Almost nothing died instantly. That was something people said of their loved ones to soothe themselves. She would feel it, and it would be the last thing she would feel.

Rachel closed her eyes.

The horn sounded, and the blowback coming off such a big piece of metal moving so very, very fast nearly knocked her off her feet. She opened her eyes in time to see the taillights swerving across the road, the whole center of gravity of the small SUV shifting, so Rachel thought it might topple over, and then it righted itself and found its lane and continued around a curve and was gone.

Rachel had stopped running, but she was panting even harder than before. She was alone. No car. No John. He had cleared from the road. But not gone. No. He couldn’t be gone. Only dived for cover, only hidden.

With legs so cold and so full of adrenaline, she ran. She ran and ran and ran, and nothing mattered, not the lack of air, not the invisible knife in her ribs or the pain of her scars, not the scream of her muscles and pounding in her head and the slosh of her samples and the slap of her bag. She ran until her legs were like windmills turning too fast for the rest of her body to catch up. She ran until she fell, throwing herself forward and landing on her stomach with her arms and her face in the gravel and dirt just off the road. And when she looked up, she saw in front of her the blue porta-potty set up for the team. She had made it. She was back. Somewhere, somewhere nearby there were people, and she could scream. She rolled over on the ground as far as she could with her pack like a turtle’s shell behind her, braced for whatever might be above her.

Nothing.

Rachel scampered, all torn palms and scraped elbows and knees, until she was up again. She turned all 360 degrees, her knees bent, her hands up like claws. But there was nothing. Nothing but a blue porta-potty and some parked cars up ahead. There was the sound of the waves down below and the reflective road sign just before the next curve, warning drivers to slow for switchbacks.

Rachel heard herself panting like a dog. She reached up and, with bloody hands, gripped the straps of her backpack and speed-walked down the embankment, heading for the beach. She did not cross the yellow tape, did not wave or motion to her fellows or acknowledge them in any way. Maybe they saw her, and maybe they were too absorbed in this next-to-the-last day of work to pay her any mind at all. But whatever they did, Rachel did not know because all she wanted was to get to Harry’s deck, up, up, up the stairs and through the sliding door that was always kept unlocked for her.

Rachel did not stop to wipe her shoes or turn on a hallway light or grab any food or drink from the kitchen. Head down, she pushed through. Through the downstairs—no Harry in the library—to the stairs,
clomp, clomp, clomp
on the honey-colored hardwood. Had they always been this steep before, this narrow? Had there always been so many of them? It took forever to get to that first landing right in front of her bedroom door. Rachel shoved her hand into her pocket for the shiny new brass key that had come with the lock. She closed her fingers around it and pulled, taking the whole lining of her jeans pocket with her hand, turning it inside out, but she didn’t care. She needed to get in. She needed to get started. She needed—

“Hello.”

For the first time that night, Rachel screamed.

Tilda had taken the wooden stool that served as her nightstand and carried it down the stairs to the landing. She’d brought a David Foster Wallace book with her, but she kept dozing, her back leaned against the wall. It was the
clomp
of the woman’s shoes that woke her. The book sat closed on Tilda’s lap, heavy as a gallon of milk, pinning her there and, as much as anything, keeping her from toppling over. Her butt was numb. She’d been there several hours, but it had been worth it. In truth, very little could make her night any worse than it had been.

Rachel was no longer capable of pulling herself together. The best she could do was place her bloodied palm over her heart to calm her pulse rate.

“You scared me.”

Tilda could hear Harry rustling behind his bedroom door. Rachel had woken him, which was another good reason to be angry, and now she had turned her back and was putting her key in the lock, as though no further discussion was required.

“When Harry offered you a place to sleep, that invitation didn’t include the right to make structural alterations.”

Rachel blinked twice before answering. Language was slow to move from her brain to her lips. “I needed a lock.”

Tilda stood. Rachel had the door open and was walking through it. There was no way—just no way—Tilda thought. Rachel went to close the door. Tilda heard Harry crossing the hardwood floor of his room. She could hear his three-point walk, two steps and then a
clomp
of the footed cane. Tilda put her own bare foot out over the threshold. If she had thought it would come to this, she’d have worn shoes.

“I’d like to know what the hell is going on here,” Tilda said.

“I have to get to work.” Rachel shut the door as far as Tilda’s toes, not squashing them but applying enough pressure that someone less determined would have moved.

“There is no rational excuse for a houseguest to lock out the owners unless there is something going on. What is it that you don’t want us to see?”

Rachel had very few options, and all of them were bad. She could leave the door open while she worked, which was impossible. Or she could slam the door on Mrs. Streatfield’s foot and break her toes. There was no time to pack up. No time to be thrown out, and if she were thrown out, there was nowhere for her to go. She couldn’t go back to the camp with all the sneaks and the spies, and every hotel and guesthouse on the island was taken. She simply could not and would not leave this room. That’s all there was to the matter, so one way or another Mrs. Streatfield’s foot had to get moved. Rachel braced herself.

“Tilda? Tilda, what are you doing?”

Rachel could not see Harry through the crack, but she could hear him just fine.

“I’m trying to determine what sort of immoral or illegal activity is going on in this room,” Tilda said. “Because it’s sure as hell something, if this woman is installing locks in our house without permission. Jesus Christ, that’s just insane!” Tilda was exhausted, and the pitch and volume of her voice increased with every word until she was shouting.

“What’s going on? Why is everyone yelling?” Juno had opened his door and stuck his head out.

“Everyone isn’t yelling,” Harry said. “Your mother is yelling.”

“Why are you yelling?” Juno asked.

“I demand to know what is going on in that room,” Tilda said.

“Tilda, what in the hell has gotten into you?” Harry stepped, shuffled, and clomped down the short hall toward her. “Leave that young woman alone. Jesus.”

Everyone was acting like Tilda was the crazy one. How had that happened?

“Don’t you think her changing the entire doorknob is a little odd?” Tilda demanded.

“I think you’re embarrassing yourself,” Harry said.

“She changed the doorknob?” Juno asked and was ignored.

“Can you imagine the headlines?” Tilda asked. “Former senator’s home turned into drug den.”

Harry was right behind Tilda then. She had to twist at an odd angle to see him and her son, what with her leg stuck in the doorway like it was.

Harry lowered his voice, not so much that Rachel couldn’t hear but maybe enough to keep Juno out of it. “Tilda, this is not your house. This is my house, and you will take your foot out of the door so this woman can go to bed. She’s been up all night.”

Harry had pulled his navy blue terrycloth robe over his pajamas, which hung on his frame like they were two sizes too big, something that had never been true before. He had gray stubble on his cheeks. Some of the hairs were dark gray, and some of them were white, and he was paler than she ever remembered him being before. He had bags under his eyes that weren’t just puffy but looked purplish and bruised, like they would hurt if she touched them. He looked like a man who was terribly sick, who might wet his pants and start seeing and talking about relatives who had passed like terribly sick people sometimes do. He was that man—unequivocally that man—and he was telling Tilda that she was the crazy one embarrassing all of them.

Tilda took her foot out of the door, which shut like it was spring-loaded. She heard it lock from the inside. Harry didn’t say anything else. He just executed his three-point turn and headed back toward his room. Juno, who had hardly been acknowledged, returned the favor, shutting his own door without another word.

Tilda opened her mouth, but the words didn’t find their way out, and no one was there to hear what she had to say anyway.

*   *   *

It was the in-between hours, the little bit of time after the night shift had come back but before the day shift was to go. The closer to the end of the project they got, the shorter the in-between hours were, which meant Hooper had almost no time to himself, almost no time to be here, a condition made worse by John. He had become overly watchful and distrusting, aggressive really, and Hooper regretted bringing him.

Hooper’s key, unlike those the others carried, unlocked all of the cabins, including what had been Dr. Bell’s. He stood there in her space, which she had vacated several days before. The one bed that had covers looked as though someone had been in it just moments before. The sheet was pulled off to one side and dragged down onto the floor, and the blanket was kicked down in a nest at the foot. In the bathroom, he’d found nothing but hair in the sink. For a moment he’d thought the trash can would be more promising. Inside, he found packing materials and bits of Styrofoam, but none of it had labels. There was a muddy pair of socks, which was odd but unenlightening.

Whatever she had been doing, she had left little evidence behind. Hooper sat down on the spare bed. He was very tired. He had not slept more than a couple of hours at a time for a week. He had a headache, which did not respond to aspirin, and his thinking felt dull.

He moved his feet back just a few inches, moved them so that his heels were under the bed. He wasn’t even aware that he had done it, but he was aware of having kicked something. It scooted a bit across the dirty linoleum floor, and Hooper could hear the sound of years of grit.

He hung his head down to peer under the bed, and then, after a moment, climbed down onto his hands and knees. He reached into the charcoal gray dimness and pulled out two shipping boxes. They had been cut open and folded flat, and they still had the labels attached to their outsides. They were from laboratory supply companies, both of which Hooper recognized. He used them himself. The recipient was Rachel, but they had been sent care of a mailbox and shipping storefront on the island.

Hooper broke the perforation of the thin plastic envelope that held the shipping label, which, when unfolded, was also the list of contents. His eyes skimmed Rachel’s order. Whatever she was doing, it was clear to Hooper that it was very different than their work at the site. They were collecting, examining, preserving, documenting. Rachel, though, Rachel was feeding.

34.

Tilda had been so upset when she carried her stool and her book up to her crow’s nest of a room in the peak of the house, a refuge that suddenly felt like being shut away, that she was sure she wouldn’t be able to sleep. Her chest hurt, and her eyes were itchy with unshed tears. She pulled back the covers, which she always tucked in too tight, and lay down on the cold sheets. She didn’t like this pillow. It was lumpy and synthetic, and she missed her down pillow that was now in storage with everything else she owned. This room just wasn’t enough. She needed to have her own space, some place she knew she could run to if she wanted and needed. She would take care of it that day, Tilda told herself, and it was the last thought she had before falling into the dead sleep she didn’t believe would come.

*   *   *

Tilda slept for five hours, woke to her alarm, and dressed without showering. She put on a ball cap and sneakers and left the house without saying anything to anyone. She had something to take care of, someplace to be.

Out on the beach, the wind had picked up, tiny bits of salt and sand buffeted her, and she let them. She had, it seemed, run out of resistance. And now, she would wait. She would stand there and breathe in the brine, and both she and the boat would wait.

It helped to think they were together in this, absurd as that sounded. It was only a boat, a thing not a person, but it was steady and predictable in a way that other things that should have been were not. And like her, the boat was stuck, tied to the house, unable to get away when it needed. There was a long list of things that Tilda could not help, but this was not on that list. This was fixable.

The boat’s rudder and centerboard, like the belly fin of a fish, pivoted up, leaving a smooth bottom that could lie on a trailer or be pushed across sand, but at twelve feet from port side to outrigger,
Serendipity
was as wide as it was tall. Tilda knew her limits. Even if the beach had not been blocked off, the distance between house and water was too great. She had called up the island’s largest marina the day before, explained her situation, and had been promised a small regiment of men.